When my grandma left me more than half a century of diaries, she gave me much more than large boxes of small books. She gave me a keyhole through which to peer into the span of her life. Often at night I draw open another volume and close my eyes to breathe in the faint […]
“I would love to get my child on Memoria Press, but I can’t figure out where.” That was my very first forum post three years ago. It was 3:00 a.m. in mid-August. By 10:00 a.m. Cheryl Swope had responded with a customized curriculum plan for my child. She recommended we switch to the Simply Classical […]
Recently I attended some out-of-town meetings on parochial education. As I left my hotel room to face the long day ahead of me, prepared but a little hesitant to begin the extended and mind-intensive work, I gathered my name tag and folder. I scanned the hotel room one last time to see if I had […]
Classical writings possess a distinctly concise wisdom. Rather than distant relics or dusty artifacts, these treasures instruct our children in our own time. When we want to introduce classical literature, Aesop is a good place to start. Aesop’s fables have long been considered “the ideal pedagogical vehicle, second only to the Bible when it comes […]
I usually enjoy planning for an upcoming school year, but last summer was different. Very different. For the first time the schedules of six school-aged children and a toddler stared back at me. All my children have various combinations of challenges: anxiety, attention, sensory, memory, emotional. With a family business and a homeschool ministry on […]
One of the most heartbreaking things I hear is fatigued resignation from a parent: “I loved the curriculum, but I gave up after the first few weeks of trying to make my child like it. Maybe he would do better with a non-traditional approach, like ‘discovery learning.’” Such a homeschooler has often spent months researching […]
Before we drove home from the Memoria Press Sodalitas Gathering this past summer, a family friend met my daughter Michelle and me for breakfast. John has a degree in theological languages and a deep interest in philosophy, and he inquired about our work. More broadly he asked about the endeavor we call classical education that […]
“I think I need to go to the hospital.” Those words felt really melodramatic, but I had just texted them to my husband. “Don’t worry,” he said. “Help is on the way.” I couldn’t move; I just kept staring into space. It felt like my brain was broken. I was terrified. A knock at the […]
Amid the bustle of boys just released from school, I searched the crowd for my 12-year-old son, Louis. He approached me with tears in his eyes. Both he and his younger brother, Ben, had competed as finalists in their school’s poetry recitation competition that day. The previous year, the boys had won first place together. […]
In some circles the word “curriculum” is anathema. It is far better, this thinking asserts, to take a relaxed approach to education, to teach a la carte, or to let the child decide what and when to study. We must not be “dogmatic.” Different children must study different things—or so we begin to believe. We […]